I think I'm a part of the first generation of journalists to skip print media entirely, and I've learned a lot these last few years at Forbes. My work has appeared on TVOvermind, IGN, and most importantly, a segment on The Colbert Report at one point. Feel free to follow me on Twitter or on Facebook, write me on Facebook or just email at paultassi(at)gmail(dot)com. I'm also almost finished with my sci-fi novel series, The Earthborn Trilogy.

Facebook Didn't Kill Digg, Reddit Did

Yesterday’s news that social media site Digg had been sold for $500K was both shocking, and not surprising at all. The news was somewhat expected at some point given the site’s steep decline in popularity and visitors over the past few years. It’s shocking because Digg used to be valued at close to $200M, and it goes to show that even giants of the web are vulnerable to complete and utter collapse.

Why did Digg die a slow and painful death? It depends on who you ask. In the wake of this news, nearly every major outlet credits Facebook and Twitter with delivering the killing blow. While both sites are large and have grown while Digg shrunk, to credit them with the destruction of the site is incorrect. Though both are technically “social media” sites, neither truly replicated the functionality of Digg as a vote-based news stream. Only one other site did: Reddit.

Digg and Reddit were like warring siblings a few years back. Digg was the charming older brother, sending out millions of hits to stories that hit its front page with a lovely web 2.0 design. Reddit was its scraggly younger sibling, a confusing wall of white text and blue links that sent out far fewer hits.

But over time, Digg changed. Redesign after redesign unnerved loyal users. Finally, one new version, v4, was so atrocious that there was a mass exodus from the site altogether. The new site was a disaster both visually and content-wise, as “sponsored links” were thrust onto the front page and users felt like they were being packaged and sold to companies.

So where did all these disgruntled users flee to? Well, as most of them were already using Facebook and Twitter for social reasons alongside Digg, Reddit was the obvious choice. The balance of power tipped into the simpler site’s favor, and as Digg became more and more irrelevant, Reddit was growing by leaps and bounds.

As seen here. Guess when v4 was? (via Quantcast)

The most credit I’ve seen given to Reddit for Digg’s demise was a WSJ article that said “Newer social-news website Reddit Inc. also stole some of Digg’s thunder. Last December, Reddit drew more visitors than Digg for the first time, according to comScore, and since then it has maintained that lead.” You’re damn right it’s maintained that lead. Has anyone looked at Reddit’s traffic recently? Data from December shows 34M unique visitors with two billion page views. Reddit didn’t just “surpass” Digg, they beat them into the ground.

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Exactly right, Kashmir. Reddit benefited hugely from Digg’s self-immolation. At most, you might say that maybe some of Digg’s users would have come back when it reversed some of the version 4 changes if they hadn’t gravitated to Reddit by then. But that’s not usually how things work in the social game. Do-overs are rare.

Agreed, Kashmir (what an interesting name you have)! Digg lost their startup leanness and leverage to innovate, failed to iterate (instead made radical changes that alienated many and pleased few) and keep the system free of manipulation. Reddit was just better cared for and was there to catch the ebbing flow of dissidents (myself included).

Exactly this. I was a young user on digg and I fled for reddit on the redesign. As the years go on, I am getting much more use out of reddit these days. It has pretty much eliminated any of my other browsing habits. I used to visit all kind of blog sites before. Now, pretty much reddit, youtube, facebook.

Why bother sifting through the shizznizzle* when other people are doing it for you?

From Web 2.0 media darling whose fanboys drowned out all questions of, “How is this thing going to make money?” to “We need to retool to make money, so let’s screw the pooch with horrible product redesigns.”

Anybody who thinks Reddit did anything more than not die during Digg’s implosion completely missed the story unfolding before them.